Author Responses: I'm doing my classic and responding to your reviews!
Nice: Thanks! And here is more. Oh and I am the writer...so never fear, I shall add more as I can!
aisu fenikkusu: I hope I made your first Dynasty Warriors fanfiction a good one!
Diao Chan rose early the next morning. She found her dreams were keeping her awake rather than putting her into a deep sleep. She had not seen Lu Bu last night, to her dismay and maybe that was why the nightmares were so strong and so harsh. She was brushing her hair calmly and gazing within the mirror when she sharply told herself the nightmares were not of the present and were not foretelling the future and therefore should not be something to be feared and should merely roll off her back. Despite her firm order to herself to shrug the dreams off and to set them aside, they continued to plague the back of her mind as she walked down the hall. She was bored, no two ways around it. She was just plain bored.
Despite her exhaustion from lack of good night's rest, she could not bring herself to sleep. Diao Chan was too scared of the nightmares that lay in the land beyond to shut her eyes and let herself drift away. She was walking down the hall when she spotted him for the first time that day. He was walking the opposite way, coming towards her as a sub-general was rambling off reports to him. He was obviously annoyed and equally bored as her, but he said nothing.
Lu Bu was also equally observing the beauty walking towards him as much as she was of him. She seemed bored and by her gait, she seemed to be more or less sauntering around aimlessly in hopes for something to do or someone to talk to about anything. He had forgotten the sub-general was even there and could only hear a low hum of his voice as he continued to babble on and on, still not understanding the point that he, Lu Bu, didn't really care at the moment. His interests were more set on the woman approaching him as she walked with her head unbowed and her eyes averted. But because she showed no fear or no recognition that he was there, he was annoyed.
It was as if small sensations in the back of his mind kept clawing at him in frustration that she was walking towards him without even to seemingly take note of him. Lu Bu was highly annoyed when no one showed any sort of recognition for him. The soldiers feared him and did what he told them to do, the women sometimes threw themselves at him or tried to avoid him out of fear, and even children in villages seemed to fear him. Dong Zhou respected him, but for some odd reason or another, he could not get a single thread of fear out of the fat man. But he did not mind, so long as Dong Zhou still respected what his "son" was capable of doing.
Unlike everyone else, however, Diao Chan showed no reaction to him. She did not fawn over him, nor did she start acting like a skittish rabbit around the fox. Instead, she was always calm and collected. Only the gods knew how exactly she was able to do this and maybe that's what made her seem a bit more interesting than battle at the moment to Lu Bu. She was a married woman so pursuing her was forbidden to a point, but to understand her would be satisfying enough for him. Wang Yun had promised her to him though, which only infuriated Lu Bu at the very thought of it. Lu Bu decided that if he ever saw that conniving bastard again, he would be sure to eliminate him.
She passed by him, his eyes still watching her and her eyes staring straight ahead as if he were air. He did not look back at her and rather kept walking as Lu Bu heard her quiet footsteps cease. "Lu Bu." Despite her softness in her tone, as she was always so soft-spoken around him, Lu Bu nearly flinched in surprise that she spoke, breaking the silence that had surrounded him as she was walking by. Both Lu Bu and the sub-general turned to face the lord's wife as she smiled. "Could I please have a word with you?"
Lu Bu glanced to the sub-general who instantly started in. "We have to discuss these issues and tactics for the battles up ahead, we can't possibly neglect them."
"They can wait," Lu Bu sharply ordered.
"Yes, general," the sub-general bowed and quickly walked away from the pair, the longer he stayed, the more he shortened his life and his chances of surviving any rage that could spark within Lu Bu. He shuddered as he rounded a corner and thought of the horrors Lu Bu could put him through.
Lu Bu walked the short distance to Diao Chan before speaking again, "What is it?"
"I just saw you with that sub-general, you looked rather bored with whatever he was speaking to you about and I myself am rather bored this morning, so maybe we could talk for a while?" The question was innocent and put down on the table so innocently as well that it caused him to raise a suspicious brow. "I mean, if you'd like to spare some of your time to talk with me, you don't have to," she added quickly. What was she up to? It raised his curiosity. Lu Bu figured to himself what the hell? He had nothing better to do anyways.
"For a while," he replied as they walked in the direction she had been walking in.
"I hardly see you anymore," she began, "how are you these days?"
"Fine," the general replied once more. Diao Chan held back sighing, this was going to be more difficult to carry a conversation with him than she thought.
"That's good," she replied with a smile in an attempt to keep the conversation going. "Is everything well on the battlefield?"
"So far."
"That's good," she replied with a yawn. "Oh forgive me," when he said nothing, she continued. "I haven't been sleeping well as of late."
Diao Chan had managed to grab his attention and spark his interest once more with that single comment as he gazed down at her. "Why not go nap if you are so tired?"
Diao Chan looked down and blushed with almost a giggle, "You'd probably think of me as childish if I told you."
"I won't," he replied. The comment made her blush once more, but it was not a programmed look as her first blush. Despite Lu Bu's almost lack of emotion within his voice, she felt the heat of blushing creep to her cheeks.
"It's just what I see after I go to sleep. The nightmares," she began, trying to dictate what they were without giving too much away. "I guess you could say I'm frightened by them. Some of the things I see, I don't like and I fear."
"What sorts of things?" he asked, trying to get more information about this mysterious woman.
"I…I'd rather not discuss them, if that's ok," she said, looking down. Diao Chan seemed almost ashamed of whatever these nightmares contained within them as she gazed at the ground in front of her, no longer quite as confident as she was before. She seemed to be more vulnerable as her thoughts reflected in her dark eyes. "But, I fear what I may see, so I try not to sleep. I try to keep the demons away," she spoke once more, looking up at him, breaking him of his observing thoughts. Lu Bu could see the confident spark back in her eyes as the flame of her conviction that she was brave to think about, but not witness whatever hellish imagery she saw after she closed her eyes to slumber.
"You have to face your demons sometime," he replied. "Only a coward hides from them." It wasn't meant to be a direct insult to her, but a flicker of hurt passed through her eyes. Diao Chan went back to looking straight ahead, as they continued to walk. She didn't even know where they were at the moment. Maybe he was right; maybe she was a coward for refusing herself a nap and for being so pathetic as to let the nightmares enter. But what could she do? Diao Chan decided something.
"There are just some fears you are unable to quell within this life," she replied almost coldly to the general. "Everyone is afraid of something or someone at one time in their life. It's impossible to be fearless. Without fear, you do not have instincts and without instincts and the drive to evade your fears, you cannot survive." They stopped at an intersect as she continued her rant, looking at the floor as she absentmindedly placed her hand to the back of her neck and lightly scratched it before returning it to her side. "Though, I'm sure you are correct, Lu Bu." She looked up at the general with a smile. "I shall take your advice into consideration and try to find sleep. I will not let these fears control me like you do not let your fears control you."
He didn't know how to react to what she was saying. Rarely did he ever give advice, especially advice that anyone would ever listen to and take into consideration or to heart. After all, many just saw him as a tool or as a warrior, just another pawn in the complicated games they were playing on the battlefield. But the lovely Diao Chan, who obviously did have a brain within that pretty little head of hers, was listening to what he said. He kicked himself mentally for not saying anything and just staring like, or how he saw it, an idiot.
"Thank you for your time," she said with a respectful bow. "Will you be joining us for dinner?"
"No."
"I see…" Diao Chan replied with what sounded like disappointment in her voice. "I shall see you at a later time then." She gave another bow and said another thanks before turning and walking away from him with her footsteps echoing off the walls and her words echoing in his head.